27 September 2015

Bradwell

A PEACEFUL protest including a flotilla of boats will be held on Mersea Island by campaigners fighting against a new nuclear power station at Bradwell. Campaign groups are joining forces for the Fight Against Bradwell – Fab. spokesman for the group said: “Amid growing fears Bradwell is about to be handed over to the Chinese to build a new nuclear power station, people of the local communities, including Mersea Island and Maldon areas, are uniting. “With a Chinese delegation, including China’s president, due to visit the UK in October, people feel now is the time to really show their opposition and make their voices heard. “Protesters will gather on the beach opposite the current power station, while a flotilla of boats and all manner of seafaring vessels, will join the protests on the river. “Hundreds are expected to take part, as support grows by the day.” The protest will take place during the afternoon of Sunday, October 4, from 3.30pm near the monkey steps.

Hinkley

EDF Energy announced two more preferred bidders on Thursday for contracts worth over 100 million pounds for its Hinkley Point C nuclear project in southwest England as it prepares to make a final investment decision. Engineering group Rolls-Royce has been selected to supply heat exchangers to be used in the planned new power station in a contract worth over 25 million pounds, EDF Energy said in a statement. In addition, a partnership between Rolls-Royce and engineering company Nuvia has been chosen as the preferred bidder for a contract valued at over 75 million pounds to design, install and commission waste processing and treatment systems.

EDF Energy has announced another series of preferred bidders for the Hinkley Point C new nuclear build project. Once the final investment decision for the project is made, Rolls-Royce will supply heat exchangers at Hinkley. Furthermore a Rolls-Royce/Nuvia partnership has been selected to design procure, install and commission two systems for the treatment and waste processing of reactor coolant in contracts with a combined worth of over £100 million. Today’s announcement means the preferred bidders for Hinkley Point C are set to deliver work worth a total of more than £1.5 billion. Commenting on today’s announcement Keith Parker, Chief Executive of the Nuclear Industry Association said: “Hinkley Point C represents one of the greatest opportunities for the UK’s manufacturing sector for decades. With contracts worth over £1.5 billion already announced, Hinkley will play an important role in revitalising the UK’s stalling manufacturing industry. Large-scale infrastructure projects like Hinkley are crucial in revitalising manufacturing output and will help rebalance the UK’s economy.”

Dieter Helm, professor of energy policy at Oxford University, considers the Chinese involvement in Hinkley to be very much against Britain’s interests. The professor, a leading expert in the field of energy policy and a member of the economic advisory committee at the Department of Energy and Climate Change, said that the Chinese contribution should be replaced with UK government debt or specific nuclear guaranteed bonds that could cut the cost of capital from 10% to 2%. In a paper entitled British Energy Policy – What Happens Next?, he says: “Add in the military and security issues of letting Chinese state-owned companies into the heart of the British nuclear industry, and it seems positively perverse to prefer Chinese government money to British government money in so sensitive a national project.” After the explosions in Tianjin, which highlighted China’s lamentable industrial safety record, and the announcement in September that the US was considering financial sanctions against China over alleged cyber-attacks on Western state institutions and industry, it is increasingly apparent that the UK government’s China-friendly nuclear policy is risky in the extreme. It seems the Government is not listening – in September, on a trade visit to China, Chancellor George Osborne also invited Chinese nuclear interests to design, build and operate a new nuclear plant at Bradwell in Essex.

US

The Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station was already facing rising costs, declining revenues, and an energy market increasingly inhospitable to nuclear power. And then the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission delivered some really bad news. The commission this month downgraded the safety rating of the 43-year-old plant in Plymouth, which it now rates as one of the three least-safe units among the nation’s 99 reactors.

Submarines

A British nuclear submarine has been caught on camera after it apparently became stricken with technical problems while on a top-secret mission in one of the most dangerous parts of the world. Satellite images show the Royal Navy vessel undergoing repairs at a port less than 100 nautical miles from Iran.

Trident

The email that dropped into tens of thousands of inboxes at lunchtime on Friday began innocuously enough with the words “Thank you”. But its message struck dread into the hearts of moderate Labour MPs and activists. Bearing the Jeremy Corbyn campaign logo, it urged -recipients to back the new Labour leader’s hard-left programme — including scrapping Trident — “at every turn” at the party conference and urged them to campaign on the internet and “with friends, family and colleagues”.

Renewables – solar

THE switch is set to be flicked on the largest solar panel farm in Scotland this week. Mackie’s of Scotland said the installation of almost 7,000 panels on its Aberdeenshire farm would generate some 1.8 megawatts – the amount of energy required for the firm to make four million litres of its most famous product, ice-cream. It marks the latest stage in a £6.5 million renewables investment programme which has included a fourth wind turbine and new biomass energy plant.

CCS

The likely collapse of Drax power station’s bid for funding for a £2bn carbon capture project brings a rival scheme in Grangemouth back into competition for government support, a leading carbon capture specialist has said. Along with Peterhead power station, the White Rose development at Drax in North Yorkshire, is one of two remaining bidders in the UK government’s flagship Carbon Capture and Storage Commercialisation Competition. Ministers are expected to announce early next year whether a £900m funding pot will be given entirely to one bidder, shared between them or not awarded at all. But last week, after five years of planning, the Drax power company said that “critical reversals” in government support for renewable energy since May’s general election had undermined its confidence in the viability of the project and that it was pulling out.

Gov thinking seems to have finally caught up with reality - main question is not how best to make the taxpayer cough up for new nuclear. No justification for spending our money on outdated technology when renewables cheaper, quicker to build and cleaner.
https://t.co/PpeTfaBNpA

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